The inventive concepts disclosed herein relate generally to the field of emergency operation of an aircraft. More particularly, embodiments of the inventive concepts disclosed herein relate to assisting a pilot in determining the glide distance of an aircraft during an engine shutdown or other malfunction.
In the event that an aircraft loses functionality of its engines, whether from insufficient fuel or from engine malfunction, a pilot of the aircraft must maneuver the aircraft and make an emergency landing without any forward thrust (i.e., by gliding the aircraft). The pilot may be aware of emergency landing locations determined prior to takeoff, but the pilot may not be certain if the aircraft is able to glide far enough to reach an emergency landing location. Furthermore, when the engines of an aircraft fail, a flight management system of the aircraft may also shut down or malfunction, leaving the pilot to estimate a range that the aircraft can glide given the current altitude of the aircraft.